Milk in cardboard packaging: is it possible?

A group of young Brazilian designers has designed a kit made up of a cardboard shell and four flexible envelopes of 700 ml each: the cardboard, which is basically a secondary pack, makes the envelope rigid and protects it; the four «recharges» are in direct contact with milk and are entered in the external shell.

Is composite packaging really the best solution for milk packaging or is it possible to think about something different? There may be alternatives.

A group of young Brazilian designers, i.e. Danilo Saito, Maira Kondo, Akira Mizutani, Lau Bellesa and Mariana Mascarenhas, have thought about one alternative. They designed a packaging concept, which has the potential to revolutionize the way to package milk if it is applied on an industrial scale.

The designers team thought about «disassembling» the composite packaging in two parts that are physically different one from the other: an internal envelope in flexible film obtained from renewable sources (maize, based on the project), closed with a screw cap, and an external container in reusable cardboard.

The designers believe that this proposal offers several advantages, especially from the point of view of sustainability.

First of all, the volume of each envelope is more in line with the milk consumption figures of increasingly small households and this influences, at least potentially, food waste.

Furthermore, the separate parts of the packaging facilitate the handling and disposal of the empty package: the cardboard enters the paper recycling chain and the envelope the plastic recycling chain; when possible, the empty package can be even composted.

Furthermore, the fact of reusing the same cardboard shell each time reduces the use of cellulose.

Therefore, the project definitely pays great attention to environmental issues!